Restoration of the age related allowance

margaretclare

teajug wrote: »

Tesco have good deal with lean mice, it is going very cheap, if you like that sort of meat.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/health/healthnews/9171193/Tesco-told-to-shut-flagship-Covent-Garden-store-over-serious-mice-infestation.html

Thanks very much for the tongue-in-cheek response! I was responding to someone else who talked about Tesco mince.

To all the people now in their 60s who worked very hard, well, I am in my 70s and I too worked very hard. But I didn't work anywhere near as hard as the previous generations. My mother literally scrubbed floors for a living and I am incredibly grateful for the opportunities I was given by the hard work of the family I grew up in. I don't know where I'd have been if it hadn't been for them. Having said that, DH and I both worked from ages 16 to 67. I had a few years out, but even at university I worked for 14 weeks every summer doing night shifts in a maternity unit.

Yes, GD has a job. She'll have been there from 5 am this Sunday morning and many people wouldn't even get out of bed to do that job. My point was: she hoped to have a proper career with a structure and some prospects, and full-time! Staying on at school and doing a BTEC qualification has not done her a scrap of good so far.

perhaps when you get to 65 (67)in my case and have been paying your dues for 50 years or more you wont find it so difficult to understand
my taxes probably paid the child benefit your mother was claiming until you were 16?

My taxes are still paying somebody's benefits. I've paid tax since 1951 and will be paying it for the rest of my life, so will DH. That's the price of living in a civilised society.

DavidLaGuardia

mirabelle wrote: »

E-Petition on the government's website has now reached nearly 32,000 signatures this morning.

This can be found under e-petition "restoration of age related tax allowance."

Not something i'm in favour of but....
Another petition? <Roll eyes>. When will people learn that policticians have always paid more attention to the letters (which are perceived to be the tip of any 'zeitgeist iceberg') than semi-anomynous and perhaps half-hearted signatures on petitions? - especially ones made by a few clicks on the keybooard. If these 32,000 mean business, get them all to write individual letters to their local MP and ministers. Incidentally: in terms of petitions to paliament, it's always the number of them that matter more than the number of signatures on each one.

BLB53

If these 32,000 mean business, get them all to write individual letters to their local MP and ministers.

Better still, if they really are seriously agrieved, they should organise a march and rally at Number 10.
I honestly don't believe signing an e-petition will change very much at all.

Ainsley1

"What's gone before is irrelevant. It could be argued that the mess the young find themselves in is down to the selfish attitude of your and my generation Len.
So why should they pay?" wrote srcandas.

Unfortunately what has gone on before is very relevant and is ignored at our peril. We can perhaps ignore ancient history (but there are still lessons to be learnt) but for example recent history shows that executive pay has risen from an average of four times the normal salary to over forty times current average salary so not much evidence of sharing there! Perhaps you would argue that the change is irrelevant as that compares historical figures (and we could put forward examples of lack of supertax (over 90%), high inflation, very low life expectancy, workhouses, slavery, debtors prisons, poor workplace H&S ; welfare support, better health, much better prospects, improved qualifications, freedom, etc. etc. All historical or not currently problems or have been improved owing to historical activity.

Still think history is irrelevant?

mirabelle

E -petition signatures on the government site has now increased to 53,576 and rising for restoring the age related tax allowance.

SallyG

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/personalfinance/pensions/9181288/Granny-tax-Government-promised-last-year-to-keep-raising-pensioners-allowances.html

"1.128 As announced in the June Budget 2010, the Government has reviewed how the CPI can be used for the indexation of taxes and duties while protecting revenues. Consistent with this, the default indexation assumption for direct taxes will be the CPI from April 2012. To ensure employers and older people do not lose out, for the duration of this Parliament the annual increases in the employer NICs threshold, and the age related allowance and other thresholds for older people, will be over-indexed compared to the CPI, and will increase by the equivalent of the RPI. The Government will review the use of the CPI for indirect taxes once its fiscal consolidation plans have been implemented and the duty increases it inherited from the previous Government have come to an end."

SallyG

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/personalfinance/pensions/9181288/Granny-tax-Government-promised-last-year-to-keep-raising-pensioners-allowances.html

http://cdn.hm-treasury.gov.uk/2011budget_complete.pdf

"1.128 As announced in the June Budget 2010, the Government has reviewed how the CPI can be used for the indexation of taxes and duties while protecting revenues. Consistent with this,
the default indexation assumption for direct taxes will be the CPI from April 2012. To ensure employers and older people do not lose out, for the duration of this Parliament the annual increases in the employer NICs threshold, and the age related allowance and other thresholds for older people, will be over-indexed compared to the CPI, and will increase by the equivalent of the RPI. The Government will review the use of the CPI for indirect taxes once its fiscal consolidation plans have been implemented and the duty increases it inherited from the previous Government have come to an end."

srcandas

Ainsley1 wrote: »

"What's gone before is irrelevant. It could be argued that the mess the young find themselves in is down to the selfish attitude of your and my generation Len.
So why should they pay?" wrote srcandas.

Unfortunately what has gone on before is very relevant and is ignored at our peril. We can perhaps ignore ancient history (but there are still lessons to be learnt) but for example recent history shows that executive pay has risen from an average of four times the normal salary to over forty times current average salary so not much evidence of sharing there! Perhaps you would argue that the change is irrelevant as that compares historical figures (and we could put forward examples of lack of supertax (over 90%), high inflation, very low life expectancy, workhouses, slavery, debtors prisons, poor workplace H&S ; welfare support, better health, much better prospects, improved qualifications, freedom, etc. etc. All historical or not currently problems or have been improved owing to historical activity.

Still think history is irrelevant?

The lessons from history are important. However saying "In the past I had this so it must be right" is not learning from history. It's just greed.

The divide between rich and poor is an issue. The removal of this tax benefit in reality aids that. Poor retired people gained nothing from these tax breaks.

So lets get on and resolve the issues with the super earners and boardroom pay and stop screaming every time some minor change impacts us as individuals.

Ainsley1

I agree Srcandas that there are bigger issues in the overall scheme of things but I hope that you consider a pensioner (or anyone for that matter) on say 12-15K income as actually poor. One can survive on that level but I hope that pensioners, especially those who have been financially responsible, do not have to just survive and should not subsidise those on much higher incomes by paying tax. Any deduction on that level of income is to be deplored and it is certainly not minor (if of small monetary value) to those people.

I am not screaming, it does not affect me (i.e. my taxation) but to resolve the bigger issues we need to consider all and the fact that a promise has been broken (as pointed out above) to one section of society that can least afford it. The lack of time to take action for the (perhaps few) who will be affected is serious and having suffered worse conditions etc. in the past than the current generations should be taken into account. That is not greed it is just one small step to make an equitable society. [ saying you didn't have it so good in years gone by but 'lets ignore that' and the 'younger generation must have it better than you', is closer to greed]

Improving the situation for the even poorer pensioner will most likely result in another unfair situation or anomolies but yes we should nevertheless strive to effect improvement - for all without the anomolies etc. Explain why a (OK) not very rich pensioner (I'll not label them poor) living in fuel poverty, transport poverty, ill health, needing to pay for their care and prescriptions etc. should subsidise the lazy relatively well off on high levels of benefits. (not to take away anything from those who truly need support] If you argue that low paid workers do this too you are quite correct, but one does argument/case does not mutually exclude the other. Pensioners however have already done their bit and paid up front!

mirabelle

In view of some members comments on Petitions having no effect, I think it may be worth mentioning again that this is a Petition set up on the Government Site for the purpose of bringing public interest to the House for Debate if the numbers of Petitioners reach 100,000.